Memoirs Of a Vinyl Junkie – part 2

He is staring anxiously at the classroom clock counting the nanoseconds. It’s almost 10 and in about an hour or so the boxes with the new releases at the record store downtown are bound to open. There is no way he can make it before 2, unless he skips the last hour at school. He already knows that’s exactly what he is going to do.
The guy behind the counter had promised him that the tunes he was searching for the last weeks would be included in those boxes. It was not the first time the guy made such a promise just to get rid of him, but it didn’t worth the risk. He had to be there in person; phone-calls were never effective. Everybody, who has been at a record store more than twice, can tell a story about a record in a shelf already reserved for a radio producer, a dj or a mate of the store owner.
His impatience was intensified by the fact that every Tuesday morning all the big dogs of the scene would be there. He was a bit intimidated by them and the fact that they always had priority over him to listen to the tunes in the private booth was a bit frustrating. He could not spend as much as they did, as his only resource was his weekly allowance, so their priority status, however irritating it was, actually made sense.

13:10

He enters the record store which is already packed and many familiar faces are already searching the shelves and discussing with the guys behind the counter. There is a queue on the decks where one can hear a preview of a record before he can buy it. He heads directly to the jungle/breakbeat section. He knows that the possibility to find on the shelves the records he was looking for is much greater than to find them behind the counter. He’s right! Two records of the list are already there along with a couple of promos he should definitely check out. He picks them all up and visits the other sections waiting for a slot in the private booth.

13:50

Searching through the other sections he discovers an album* that includes a tune he had heard last week on the radio and can’t get it out of his mind ever since. He had made a deal with his mates that none of them would “trespass” another genre and if anyone ever did so would not at least buy it. He picks it up, although it is not a jungle/breakbeat record. He really loves the tune and the artwork of the sleeve and after all nobody had to know!

15:05

He got out of the booth finally with the 5 records at hand. He had to buy all of them but could not afford everything. Reserving one or two was not a choice, because it was almost a certainty that the guy behind the counter would give them away the next minute. He pulled the trick he had patented himself: he hid 2 promos in the rock ‘n’ roll section and would come back later in the week to pick them up. He had tried it twice in the past and everything worked perfect. Also, a German dj** would be playing in town on that very Saturday and the admission fee equaled the price of a record. Tough choice, but all his mates would be there and of course he would be the last to miss it, although techno/trance was not exactly his style.

15:20
He is now in front of the counter ready to pay for the merchandise. Beside him is a popular dj chatting with the store owner. Suddenly the dj looks at the plastic bag with the records and comments sarcastically: “that is serious stuff you’re buying kid, do you really know what this music is all about?”

He didn’t answer as he felt that no reply would be appropriate at the time and headed for the door. Some seventeen years later he would like to re-live that moment and shove the records up the arrogant dj’s a**.

* for the history, the album was “Accident in Paradise” by Sven Väth and the track “L’ Esperanza”, a classic 17 years later